What was your biggest Xmas waste of money?

A question about : What was your biggest Xmas waste of money?

What have you bought for past Christmas celebrations that gave you a serious case of buyer's remorse? We want to tap MoneySavers' collective knowledge on the worst things you've spent your cash on during the festive season. What money-suckers would you advise others to avoid?

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Best answers:

• You're asking the wrong people!
• Food - there is always too much.
  Every bl00dy year. But can I persuade anyone to cut down?
  It appears to be tradition to buy too much.
• to the people who on Christmas Eve who stack their trolly with about 78 loaves of bread, a cow's entire daily production of milk etc
  the shops are only shut for two days maximum
  if Aunty Maud who hasn't visited the last 20 years she is unlikely to visit this year and even if she does she is coming to see you and not stuff her face
• I bought my brother a boxed set of DVDs of a TV programme called "Wife Swap."
  It was nothing to do with wife swapping at all, just nagging women living in each others houses.
  Total waste of money.
• My mum loves shopping for 'tat' (think poundshop, the worst things in charity shops etc). One year I bought her expensive brands of things like candles, shower gel, body lotion etc thinking 'nice stuff' would be a treat. She never used any of it!
• I bought my parents a walk round ashfown Forrest Lima park they like walking and animals and thought it would be interesting. Was over my budget but thought they would love it. They opened it and dad told Me was crap! Why do I bother
• Putting a stamp on envelope for this waste of time - https://twitter.com/bepo836/status/537512205567393792
  The letter the child gets back is awful. So bland and generic. My two kids got exactly the same letter back. I know they claim it's (almost) a free service but when such little effort is put into it, it makes you wonder why they bother.
• Fresh christmas trees - they cost a fortune, and while they look good, shed needles, even the ones that say they don't, so I invested Ј20 in a 75% discounted luxury artificial tree in the January sales. That was 6 years ago, and it still looks good, plus folds away into nothing in the back of the understairs cupboard ready for next year.
• And while I'm on the subject of christmas trees - don't bother with a 'living tree', because it never survives beyond January or February, then you have this brown unattractive half-dead thing hanging around in a pot, hoping it might revive come spring - it doesn't.
• Fireworks.
  Me and my mates thought it would be clever to spend Ј25 each on fireworks (making up about Ј250). It seemed like a good idea, but considering how slow it is to light each firework, stand back, wait for the single one to finish, then light the next... It's really rubbish compared to a proper show.
• I'm too mean to waste money at Christmas. I set a budget, find out exactly what people want and buy it. All the food gets eaten and all the drinks drunk. However, it does all cost a small fortune and if I were broke I just wouldn't do it.
• We bought MIL a fancy new whisk last year, it cost quite a lot and matched exactly with her new kitchen. She opened it and put it on the side, never got a thank you and didn't get a present in return. This year, she's getting a big o'pile of zilch!
• Bath sets...well really isn't a waste but I always end up with cheap poundland stuff and I cant use it so it goes to charity. this year ive vowed anyone who buys me cheap bath stuff are getting it back for birthday/mothers day(mother inlaw always does it even tho I told her)
• Food is the big one in our house - my wife loves to cook and loves to treat people so buys and cooks way too much food. About half gets wasted.
  Then there's the impulse toy buys for the children. I don't mind how much we spend (to a limit!), but they way my wife does it means that she always ends up spending a little bit more on one child and then has to 'top up' the others. And then ends up spending as little more on a different child and starts topping up again!
  The children don't know how much we've paid, so the question isn't how much we've spent but how much will they like the gifts - and those two are NOT directly linked.
• In our house it's the sweets/chocolates/biscuits I always buy far too much even though every year, without fail, between us we get loads of it as presents... so we're eating it well into the middle of January. Every year I say "I'm not buying it next year, we always get given loads" but then the fear is there... what if no-one buys us any this year? What if we're left on Christmas Night with no Roses/Celebrations/M&S biscuits to tuck into? Christmas would be ruined, RUINED I tell you
  It's not really a waste though as it does always get eaten or given away
  What annoys me in regards to waste of money is crap presents. We all get them, the ones where you know the giver has just grabbed the first random item they've seen with no thought at all It's not the money spent, no way, it's the thought isn't it? Or lack there of...
• Hotsparkle bought his MIL a whisk!!
  I'm afraid I really hate getting presents that are obviously for the house - no matter how nice they are! I'm not a house I'm a person!!!
  My husband bought a vase for our first Christmas together - he's had to buy flowers to go in it every week since!!
  Now I'm afraid I say "How lovely, the house will love these!"
  I even got a toilet brush one year - you can image how that went down - 1998 is forever known as the year of the toilet brush!